


Of Mutual Needing

by orphan_account



Category: Captain America (Movies)
Genre: Angst, Captain America: The First Avenger, Cuddling & Snuggling, Developing Relationship, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, My First Fanfic, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Pre-Captain America: The Winter Soldier, Pre-Serum, Starbuck - Freeform, Stucky - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-06-09
Updated: 2014-06-09
Packaged: 2018-02-04 00:43:36
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,600
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1760987
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"Lets hear it for Captain America!" It was a new beginning for Steve, for Captain America, the hero, but it felt like the end of something too. A relationship changing, fading. Was it ‘till the end of the line’ anymore for them?</p>
<p>Picks up mid First Avenger, and fills in some gaps with my heart-breaking headcanon. Set between Bucky’s rescue and the bar scene. There's angst and then there is cuddling. Bucky's PTSD.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Of Mutual Needing

Sergeant Bucky Barnes sat across from Steve Rogers, scrubbing three day’s dried soil from his boots. He wasn't much in the mood to talk, Steve had realised, but then most of the 107th were irritable from the exhaustion and hunger of their journey from Austria.  
“Should only be about another day’s walk from here.” Steve heard someone shout from across the distance, probably Gabriel or Jim, who were pouring over a map together. Steve glanced over at Bucky who seemed unmoved by the news and deep in thought as he scrubbed carefully.   
“Hey Buck?”   
Bucky looked over at him briefly, and something flashed in his eyes, as if it was hard to look at Steve, but almost instantly the mask of false bravado and indifference was back in place again. “Yeah?... Captain…?” He smirked, throwing a brazen grin Steve’s way.  
Steve rolled his eyes. “You hear that? Only another days walk.” Bucky flashed a grin. If you didn't know Bucky as well as Steve did, you wouldn't know it was forced.   
“Excited to see your friend the Colonel again, punk?” He bent back down to re-lace a boot, and Steve noticed his hands were noticeably shaking. He hadn't asked about what had been done to Bucky at the Hydra base. It wasn't something he was going to push, but he was filled with concern for his friend at the things his imagination was throwing at him. Honestly, he didn’t know how to approach the subject.  
“Yeah…” Steve murmured distractedly, frowning slightly.

 

***

 

"Lets hear it for Captain America!" A grin spread across Bucky’s face. He looked across at his Steve, the kid from brooklyn, always chasing the idea of being the hero, but never quite winning the fight. Bucky had sometimes imagined that Steve had always been meant for more than a scrawny kid picking fights with bullies in back alleys, and here was that dream, right next to him. 

But his smile faded as he looked around at the throng of soldiers, adoring on the hero who’d saved the day. Damn, was he proud, but bitter too. No longer was he the only believer in Steve Rogers, the puny kid from Brooklyn who’d fell ill a few too many times and had stood up to the wrong people many more times than that, with Bucky always picking up the pieces. 

It was a new beginning for Steve, for Captain America, the hero, but it felt like the end of something too. A relationship changing, fading. Was it ‘till the end of the line’ anymore for them, or were things going to be different now? 

 

***

 

Steve led Bucky into an empty tent. “Sit. Need to get you patched up Buck.” The army camp’s nurses were busy dealing with the more seriously wounded elsewhere. Steve had been glad to get away from the mass of people and all the questions. It was something he wasn’t used to.  
Bucky gave him a mock glare but hopped himself up on a table. He pulled up his trouser leg and prodded at the blistering graze that covered most of his knee, wincing at how bad it had got, untreated. He felt Steve’s breath behind him, and then a wet feeling on his ear as Steve washed off the cut that was there.

They were silent for a while, as Steve came round in front of him and knelt down, starting to clean off Bucky’s knee, kiss it softly and then wrap it in a bandage. They both enjoyed the quiet next to the racket outside. It brought to mind memories of scratches and bruises from before a certain super soldier serum, of the nurse and patient here reversed in their roles. Bucky’s silent exasperation at Steve and his tendency to get into fight after fight, but also the certain unsaid forgiveness. Steve never asking for Bucky’s help, but always receiving it whether he liked it or not. 

"Are you okay?" Steve murmured quietly. Bucky eyes were down, watching Steve’s hands work.   
"Bucky?" Steve looked up from what he was doing.  
“It’s only a scratch.”  
“You know what I mean, Buck.” 

Bucky’s mouth tilted down in concentration and his hands became fists. He felt lost and exposed for no reason, and the interior of the medic tent had him on edge. Emotion starts to bubble up and boil over, about what they did to him in that room, but he couldn’t voice it. He wasn’t used to being the fragile one of the two of them, and he admitted to himself now that there had been something about their relationship that he’d relied on like an addict. Steve had been his anchor that would have always wanted him there.

"You've always needed me, Steve. I've always been... Needed. By you." But I think I need you now. His eyes moved over to Steve’s, finally, wishing he could voice what he needed from Steve.  
"But you don't need no one now." His eyes traveled down Steve's unfamiliar new body. It was bizarre how much appearance seemed to change things. Looking at Steve now, Bucky was torn between feeling estranged from his friend who looked so different, yet at the same time… feeling like nothing had changed between them, because he knew, of course he knew, that it was still his Steve. 

Steve sighed and bought a hand up to brush across the four day old stubble on Bucky's cheek.   
"Bucky, I-"   
The sound of footsteps stopped him mid sentence, and he looked round to see a nurse enter the tent.

 

***

 

The light was fading outside, and with most of the 107th crashed out, the barracks was quiet other than a low murmur from those who were still awake. Steve had been pulled away to meet with the Colonel and be questioned, and Bucky was now lying on his back staring at the bottom of the bunk above his, lost in thought. He tried to drown out the excited muttering around him from those who couldn’t sleep, but he couldn’t ignore it when he caught whispers of Steve’s name.

Eventually the previous few day’s efforts caught up with him, and he fell into a doze. Images flickered before him, of piercing, flashing lights, of tiny needles, of disembodied voices, of-  
“Hey Bucky…”   
He sprung up and recoiled from the voice, almost falling over the other side of the bunk, pulse pounding in his ears.   
“Jesus… Steve…” His body sagged back into the previous position. “Why’d you have to do that for?” He couldn’t keep the shakiness from his voice.   
“I only whispered.” Bucky’s eyes adjusted to a bashful Steve, crawling onto the end of the bed. A spring creaked worryingly and he shuffled off quickly. “I came to… I mean, I wanted to say goodnight. And…”   
Bucky cocked an eyebrow. “And what?”  
“Wanted to see if you were okay.” He tried again on the centre of the bed, before giving up and lying next to Bucky. It was something that was so familiar and natural, Steve lying next to him, that Bucky smiled and closed his eyes again. Steve’s body fit differently around his now, his head came higher and his feet dangled off the edge of the mattress. But there was still the steady heartbeat he knew. The steady rhythm was something he needed to hold onto right then.  
“I do need you. I always will. You know that, right Buck?” He felt Steve’s breath tickle his neck as he spoke.   
“To tuck you in at night, huh.” Bucky smiled lopsidedly against Steve’s chest, but he knew Steve wouldn’t miss the hitch in his breath.  
“Shut up.” Bucky could hear the grin in his voice. “After a pause, he heard, “Is it weird for you… How different I look?”  
Bucky frowned, and said quietly, “It's been hard to adjust to, sure…” He smiled slyly and added, “I mean, hell, I’m not the prettiest anymore, its hard to get used to.”  
“You’ll always be the prettiest honey I know, James.”  
Bucky punched him on the arm playfully, wondering in the back of his mind if he could even feel that now. 

“I’ve needed you for more than… the physical stuff, Buck. Not just getting me out of fights. I can think of so many things… Like, taking me in…” With each point, he dipped his head down to kiss wherever he could reach from their position. The top of his head. “Tryin’ to get the dames into me.” Between his eyebrows. “Keepin’ me warm at night.” Hairline. “Teachin’ me to dance.” Top of his ear. “I was ready to walk to Austria to get you, Buck. Not even knowing if you were still…” He stopped because it didn’t need to be said. 

“You got my back, and I got yours, alright?” Steve murmured against his forehead.   
Suddenly Bucky found it hard to breathe, tears burning in his eyes. He knew that with Steve, he could tell himself he’d be okay.  
“I’m going to the other Hydra sites I saw on the map. Will you come with me?”  
“Of course you are. Course I am.” Bucky said shakily, smiling to himself. It was still his Steve, who wouldn’t turn down the chance to stand up to the enemy, whoever they were. And he was still going to be at his side, backing him up, except this time, Bucky thought it was likely that there would be no pieces for him to pick up after the fight.

Besides, he wouldn’t turn down a chance to crush Hydra to the ground. He wanted to see his captors bleeding and in hell.


End file.
